MCLEAN COUNTY, Ky. (7/9/13) – A Federal FEMA grant has made it possible for McClean County’s Emergency Management Agency to add five new weather sirens to several of its smaller communities.

David Sunn, director of the Emergency Management Agency in McLean County, told SurfKY News this week that previously all incorporated cities in the county with the addition of Beech Grove have had weather sirens.

The Federal FEMA grant has made the five new sirens possible at a cost of $22,000 each. The new sirens have been installed in the Buck Creek, Buttonsberry, Stringtown, Glennville, and Guffie areas.

The Guffie area is particularly important because that is where the McLean County fish and game are typically located, and there are usually between 75 to 100 people in the vicinity – specifically in the stormy season – who otherwise wouldn’t have any way of knowing about the threat of severe weather, according to Sunn.

“Any time there is a federally declared disaster and they allocate a certain amount of dollars to fund emergency relief, they also allocate an additional 10 percent of funds for mitigation projects like this one,” said Sunn.

The grant funds will also provide for a new generator that will power the county’s ambulance headquarters, as well as all of the county’s emergency and law enforcement service radio communications.